On 1 Apr 2015 at 11:44am Insecure employment wrote:
Another good reason to vote Labour .Labour will legislate to change zero hours contracts to permanent ones after twelve weeks continuous employment with one employer.The Tories and bad employers hate this.That is the clearest indication it is the right thing to do.At last a Labour party that is looking after the interests of ordinary people.I may even rejoin!Well done Ed Milliband.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 11:56am Mavis wrote:
Now I'm not an employment expert, but I don't think it takes Einstein to work out, it's the only way employers can avoid all the range of employers on-costs such as Maternity & Paternity pay, sick pay, months holiday pay, pension, eye tests, tribunal costs, redundancy pay, Jury service, Health care, Notice pay, ad infinitum!
On 1 Apr 2015 at 12:04pm Insecure employment wrote:
Exactly right Mavis.That is the way in which bad employers undercut good responsible employers who are trying to provide their employers with a reasonable standard of life and some money in their pockets to purchase goods and services themselves.That is the way we grow the economy,not by exploitation,insecurity and low wages.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 12:13pm Insecure employment wrote:
Try renting a somewhere to live if you are only on a zero hours contract,most landlords turn you down,because they know that the renters on such contracts cannot guarantee the rent every week.Zero hours contracts might be good for a small minority of bad employers and maybe some students, but are not good for most adults trying to bring up a family or thinking of starting one.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 12:29pm Country Boy wrote:
Insecure - I take it you don't run a business. If you did, would you run it as a charity?
On 1 Apr 2015 at 12:42pm Mark wrote:
Major headline in the Telegraph today 100 business leaders saying that they were staunchly endorsing The Conservatives and everyone but anyone who's big in the Fat Cat world was listed. Fido was there along with Felix and Sotty. It announced that they welcome this as they feel that's all zero epic that they don't need to pay tax anymore and that they can cheerfully expect more of the same - if Opposition parties disappear and the Tories triumph.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 12:43pm Insecure employment wrote:
I have run a business,I`m retired now.I had loyal and productive staff,I paid them well,they stayed with me,we all prospered.When I retired, I sold the business to someone that got too greedy, cut my erstwhile employees terms and conditions.The experienced staff left,the business went bust.End of story.Please don`t lecture me about small business.Well motivated ,secure and happy staff, staff especially when dealing face to face with the public are a vital part of your business.If you don`t know already know this, then you have obviously never run a business.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 1:52pm Brady wrote:
Well said insecure. Zero hours contracts are an emblem of what has gone drastically wrong with this country. A combination of New Labour and old conservative policy has allowed this all to happen. I agree about Ed Milliband. He has impressed me on a number of occasions on things like Syria and predatory capitalism. This is saying something as I have not been impressed by a politician since the 1970's! He will get my vote.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 3:04pm bastian wrote:
Well said "insecure employment", everything you have said is the root of the problem and adds to the tories fact sheet from which they state "1000 jobs created every day"-1000 crap insecure jobs.
So good to see a strong poster who when challenged shows a full and meaningful undersatnding of Business-not the usual neo -con business plan.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 3:19pm Paul Newman wrote:
All those people who would like Sports Direct out of business, no more cheap trainers and kit for the kids to go back to school with, all those nice polite Polish folk to be unemployed , growth to slow down and the deficit worsen shout RED ED and ALEX SALMON FOR ME
All those people who appreciate this is a red Ed Herring designed to divert attention from near full employment, strong growth zero inflation and deficit reduction also need the cheap trainers to get the kids back to school in decent gear and do not wish to see those nice polite Polish people unemployed shout YAY FOR CAMERON
On 1 Apr 2015 at 4:07pm Brady wrote:
Do you not think that Polish people deserve permanent contracts as well Paul? If sports direct do not have the decency to treat their workers as human beings then yes, they should go out of business and so should the manufacturers of sweat shop trainers. People can just pay a bit more for those trainers and the bosses and shareholders can earn a little bit less and child recipients of said trainers might come to live in a world where exploitation and outright slavery will be seen as inhumane employment practices from a past dark age.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 4:46pm pn wrote:
We have near full employment wages are going up and most new jobs are permanent ( the majority for the first time in years are actually going to UK citizens ). There are no more zero hour contract now there were under New Labour they are clustered in high visibility paces like retail .Here cheap migrant labour has reduced wages and worsened conditions ( Even Polly Toynbee agrees with this )
The availability of cheap and motivated workers has brought new business models into the market like Sports Direct whose ultra-cheap prices have contributed hugely to many a family budget.
Sports Direct are only making normal profits the term for the cost of market entry ), reduce them and they go with their jobs and their cut price goods .
What do you want
1 Cheap goods, employed people who need work, great deals for families who need them growth, wider tax base
OR
2 Reduce the immigration pull factor increase the cost of living, make people unemployed reduce growth and taxes
Some people just hate foreigners and would rather stick families with a massive new bill in the cause of dimly conceived loathing of capitalism. There is a wider issue about the incentive to offer training and add value for British young people and were you to say we should stop immigration so Employers had to invest in people for social reasons I would say you had a point.
Overall I think we have it about right because we can`t hide form the EU market anyway
On 1 Apr 2015 at 5:11pm Enough is enough wrote:
Directors salaries have gone up 39% in the last five years.Time for some social justice for a change.Enough is enough.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 5:12pm Country Boy wrote:
Insecure, I agree with everything you say, however, times change. Everyone would like to live in an ideal world, and don't you agree that a zero hours job is better than no job at all?
On 1 Apr 2015 at 5:33pm Annette Curtin-Twitcher wrote:
The problem, Country Boy, is that in weeks when you're not offered any work, a zero hours contract IS no job at all.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 5:45pm Insecure employment wrote:
If Britain is to pay it`s way in the world we need a a high skill,high wage economy.Our productivity is half that of the French and the Germans.We have made the choice to have higher numbers of unskilled workers in temporary low paid work.Not only does this bring in large numbers of migrant workers desperate to provide for their families back home in countries with a lower cost of living.This effectively prices out British workers who cannot live on the poverty wages that many enterprises are paying.I am in favour of the E.U.and the free movement of workers so UKIP`s narrow xenophobia is no solution .The less badly paid unskilled zero hours jobs we have in this country,the less unskilled migrants we will attract.Not only are these rubbish jobs bad for British workers they encourage British companies to concentrate their efforts in the wrong areas,usually the retailing of imported goods.Zero hours jobs do nothing to encourage companies to provide the training that our young young people need to do the productive manufacturing and the high quality service jobs we need.They are in the long term a very bad thing for the country.Yes things do change,but this country is going backwards to the insecurity of the 30s.We need a new government to start to turn this country round and provide a future for my grand kids.That, as it was after the war, will be a Labour government.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 5:53pm Boris wrote:
You all go on about the Tory con well zero hour contracts is the Labour con.
I apologise to anyone who has been listening to the radio today for going over these stats but in total 17% of our workforce is on a zero hour contract and two thirds of them are happy with their zero hour contract so that leaves just under 6% who are unhappy with their contracts.
This is no where near the massive problem that the Labour party are telling us it is. Surely country boy is quite right, a zero hour contract has to be better than no job at all.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 6:01pm bastian wrote:
Boris and Paul, I'm not sure who's world you are livin gin-it doesn't seem to be the sae one as everyone else, so we cannot "all be in it together" after all. You both sound as if you are talking from cloud cookoo land to me.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 6:09pm Biker wrote:
Zero hours contracts are a slippery slope.Time to curb them.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 6:25pm 8 miles from home wrote:
Zero hours with the Cons or 12 weeks work with Labour.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 6:49pm UKRAP wrote:
And what will UKIP`S 3? MPs do?Sweet Fanny Adams that`s what!
On 1 Apr 2015 at 7:13pm Paul Newman wrote:
Well done insecure employment. On a day in which the leaders of all the UK largest businesses and the CBI have said the Labour Party will impoverish us we have supposedly found an anonymous retired entrepreneur whose story of small Company life neatly demonstrates the sort of thing the Labour Party always say..
I think a name would be useful to counter the suspicions some may harbour that this tale is pure invention.
I `m not entirely out of sympathy with some of these sentiments ( having said some of it myself ) but we have had , in this country a highly regulated Labour Market which was deregulated by Margaret Thatcher. During her time manufacturing output actually increased whilst employment in it decreased . Productivity improved enormously
You would expect, that as one travelled back to the 70s with its highly regulated Labour force with super conditions one would encounter a nirvana of long term thinking, investment and wealth creatio , enabling the country to 'pay its way in the world, as you say.
Instead we got British Leyland , Non-stop Strikes, stagflation and no-one in their right mind would put a penny into a country where profit was a dirty word as it is again under Red Ed .
Do you seriously think that forcing higher costs onto companies will make them become more productive ? Why, would they not just relocate their Labour elsewhere, or go out of business .
On 1 Apr 2015 at 7:17pm bastian wrote:
impoverish who Paul, the rich...becasue the poor are already in poverty even though they are working.
cookoo land man
On 1 Apr 2015 at 7:31pm Arthur wrote:
Yer Paul the poor are all ready in poverty. Don't you realise that there are 3 food banks in Lewes. It's not surprising, I was in Aldi the other day and they were charging 89p for a 14" thick based pizza, how the hell are people expected to pay their Sky subscriptions when food is that expensive.
What about that poor begger down the Cliffe, whilst putting a fiver in his cap the other day I noticed that he still only had an Iphone 3, the poor man, thats how bad things have got.
I suppose Paul you think that lottery tickets grow on trees and that high strength larger comes out of the taps you nasty Tory.
Don't worry Bastion, just a few weeks from now the Labour party and hopefully their Scottish chums will be in power and the country will go back to the way it was before these clowns came in.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 7:57pm Historian wrote:
If the labour conditions and living standards are so cr@ppy here, why are they sleeping rough in Calais and risking life and limb on lorra axles to get here ? If you know of a better hole, move to it !!
On 1 Apr 2015 at 7:58pm Insecure employment wrote:
Running a business,(mine employed about 12 people ,Ok.not large but we did pretty well as I say running a business is a matter of balance.you have to balance your own self interest with those of your employees.the fact is you are both co dependent on each other and as such you both have a social responsibility to act ethically not only towards each other and your customers but towards the wider community.The economy is also a matter of balance.it could be argued that organised labour was too powerful in the 70s but that could hardly be argued now.The balance is now very much in favour of big business.We in the small business are just as much victims of what might be termed monoply capitalism as the ordinary people that we used to serve.High streets have been decimated as the tescos of this world have hoovered up what used to be our business.charity shops and betting shops proliferate.local pubs closed down whist large and impersonal barns like Witherspoons proliferate.The gap in wealth and power is obscene.The balance has to be tipped back in favour of the small person.Frankly I don`t care If you dont believe I am a retired small businessman,me and my dear family know who I am,and besides I don`t believe you are Paul Newman either.He was killed in Mexico with the Sundance Kid wasn`t he?
On 1 Apr 2015 at 8:53pm Ed Can Do wrote:
It's a sad indication of Conservatism round here that I think Labour have made a mistake here and yet PN and Boris have almost managed to convince me otherwise.
Zero hours contracts can be exploited, the solution isn't to ban them. If you are running a shop, you know how many staff you need from week to week, the opening hours are fixed and unless you are psychic, there's no way you can tell if you'll be busy or not so you book a set number of staff every day. In this situation there's no excuse to use zero hours contracts, Sports Direct are being exploitative for certain.
What about if you run a seasonal business though? Take the Pells pool as an example, they're open for four or five months and they know that based on the weather report and school holidays and such like they will be busier some times than others. Their staffing needs vary from lots on a sunny, summer holiday Saturday to none at all for the winter.
Under Labour's proposals, would the Pells have to employ all their staff as full employees? Would they then need to offer them fixed working hours? That would leave them with the choice of over-staffing and going bust or under-staffing and having serious safety issues. What would they do over the winter? Employ people to do nothing? Go through a lengthy and expensive redundancy process for the entire staff?
I don't even know if the Pells use zero hours contracts but they strike me as a business that simply could not operate under Labour's proposed system.
Even with the specific caveat that anyone working REGULAR hours becomes an employee, how do they plan on policing that? Are Labour inspectors going to come round and look at time sheets? All that will happen is that Sports Direct will just be really careful to not rota someone on for the same shift twice in two weeks. Either that or sack everyone after 11 and a half weeks, lord knows there are enough people unemployed to replace them. I've shopped in Sports Direct, I find it hard to believe the staff there get more than ten minutes training before they start work.
I applaud Labour's intentions but they've really not thought this through properly and what they are currently proposing is basically unworkable.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 9:23pm Paul Newman wrote:
You would be astonished at how often I hear this sort of thing from my clients . Yeeesh all day long with the , “can I pay more tax “, “oh for more regulation” , and “if only I could have a trade union in the place” …. Its heart-breaking to listen to the poor dears , really .
In 2013, there were 4.9 million businesses in the UK, over 99% of which were small and medium enterprises employing 14,424,000 people in the UK.The European Commission’s SME Performance Review estimates the Gross Value Added AS 49.8% of the UK economy .Looks healthy to me (Parliamentary Briefing Paper)
Now whilst I cannot find any very longitudinal stats I can see that there is no obvious trend towards fewer business between 2007 and 2011 ( oNS) and if there is a trend towards consolidation I see no evidence of it and if you think about the chance of an ordinary person starting a business in 1970 you`ll soon wonder how anyone did .
Inequality peaked at the end of the New Labour period and is about average by European standards so your definition of obscene is a little precious.
I like Tescos, I like Aldi and I like Amazon, that’s how we afford to eat and read .I agree with you on Europe, and I don’t say that there is nothing in your point about the long term harm of sucking in low paid immigrant Labour , but loading costs onto employers hurting everyone at this time is a crazy way to proceed .It will hit families in the budget , increase unemployment and dump more regulatory burdens onto Companies the colaiti0on has tried to free from just that . What we need is a sensible immigration Policy but I still say staying in the EU is the least worst option overall.
The reason for this announcement is transparently to divert attention from the mutual loathing between Labour and Business and discredit the coalition’s miraculous record on employment .
It will never happen anyway
On 1 Apr 2015 at 10:28pm Sigh wrote:
How many times? brevity.
On 1 Apr 2015 at 10:34pm Country Boy wrote:
Reading the posts on here, one would think everyone in the UK was on zero hour contracts! Tut tut, more misinformation.
On 2 Apr 2015 at 12:27am Vote Labour wrote:
Sports Direct ,which made £240 million last year in profits has 15000 workers on zero hours contracts.is that fair? Of course not! Fight back.Vote Labour.
On 2 Apr 2015 at 1:22am Fairmeadow wrote:
Amazon. Great business model. Avoid paying your taxes, so get an advantage over rivals who do. Treat your workers as scum, so get an advantage over decent rivals. We have a system that rewards such slime balls. Time for a change, I think.
On 2 Apr 2015 at 6:44am Country Boy wrote:
OK - so Vote Labour, can you assure me that you have never shopped in Sports Direct, and Fairmeadow that you have never used Amazon.
On 2 Apr 2015 at 7:41am Phfellow2004 wrote:
As this thread draws to a close, just a further reminder that two thirds of all the folk who are on zero hours contracts are quite happy with these terms and flexibility. Clearly there are some who do feel aggrieved but the noise which Labour is making about this is totally disproportionate and it purposely attempts to cloud the true implications of their economic policies which simply do not add up! The nation just cannot take the risk of handing the keys back to the two Eds who drove the car into the ditch 5/6 years ago!
On 2 Apr 2015 at 8:02am Humbert wrote:
You do realise that Labour councils employ people on zero hour contracts don't you? In Yorkshire alone over 2000 people. Is this another case of saying one thing to get elected, while doing another?
On 2 Apr 2015 at 9:14am Mark wrote:
Councils don't employ people on zero hour contracts. Sub-contractors working for councils do. That was just a bit of Daily Mail misinformation.
On 2 Apr 2015 at 9:40am Country Boy wrote:
The Councils could make it a contract condition that staff are not to be on zero hours contracts in a similar way that TfL require all their contractors to pay the London living wage.